B.Løvetann

A world where it feels like everything is working against you—especially when you’re young—is a brutal lesson to learn.
It changes you.

Where you should have felt safe and loved, you instead feel lonely, abandoned, and betrayed. And perhaps the hardest part is that wounds like these don’t simply disappear. They can stay with you for the rest of your life.
They shape the way you see the world, the way you see yourself—and perhaps even the kinds of people you are drawn to.

The ability to show compassion and empathy is a beautiful quality. But like everything else, it requires balance. When you give too much of yourself, your empathy can lead you into situations you should never have been in.

For many years, I carried a deep longing for someone who truly loved me. Someone who chose me. The movies I watched probably romanticized that longing even more.

My boyfriend gave me everything I had been searching for.
Even so, I couldn’t believe his love was real.
I kept waiting for him to leave.
But no matter how many mistakes I made, he stayed.

It took me almost six months before I finally dared to believe that he was actually there to stay.
Once that realization sank in, I fell completely, hopelessly in love. For three years, I lived on that feeling. He was an incredible person, and I loved him more than anything.

Then, when I was seventeen years old, my world fell apart.
Suddenly, my past caught up with me.

I developed social anxiety, panic attacks, nightmares, and PTSD. The trauma settled deep inside my body. Along with it came explosive anger, depression, and suicidal thoughts.

I hardly spoke about any of it.
Back then, mental health wasn’t talked about the way it is today. Instead, I walked around believing I was weak—that I simply needed to pull myself together.

My boyfriend didn’t understand what was happening to me either.
But he stayed.
It wasn’t easy—for either of us.
Still, he stood by my side.
We were together for nine years and had three wonderful children.

But life happens.

We were young, and we had very different expectations of what family life should look like. Neither of us truly understood just how essential communication is in a relationship.
When I moved out, I had to start over.
I had to rediscover who I was.
I had to answer the most important question of all:
Who was I now?

To be continued…